Temple 201-To Study

There is a movement today to build the Temple. The timing of God has everything to do with this, and we have shown that this preparation by the Lord goes all the way back to the first century, as the Temple was being destroyed by the Romans. The Lord was already preparing the hearts and minds of the people. In 1967, there was what is called the Six Day War. As a result of that war, Israel got control of the Temple Mount. Rabbi Goren was the Chief Rabbi in Israel and he said that they should start preparing to build the Temple, but there were several issues. Five days later, Moshe Dayan, the Defense Minister, gave “control” of the Temple Mount back to the Arabs/Moslems. Some said that was good because they did not think a Temple was needed, and to build one would only cause trouble. But others saw this as an opportunity lost. But everything is in the plan of God , even at this time.

When Israel spent 40 years in the wilderness, it was his plan. When they came out of Egypt, they still thought like slaves and not as a nation. When they finally entered the land, they entered as the Nation of Israel. In 1987, 20 years after the Six Day war, the Arab Intifada began and Orthodox Judaism began to study the Temple. If they had started to build the Temple in 1967, nobody was ready. They had very little archeological evidence of where anything was, they had little idea about what all the buildings were and where they would go, there were no priests, no vessels, no garments and they had very little information put together for instruction about all these things.

So, Judaism in all its various forms began to study the Temple. Archeologists have made many discoveries since 1967. The Temple is called the “house of prayer for all nations” not just Israel and many people from all nations have had a change of heart about building the Temple. In 1988 an organization called the Temple Institute began. They began to bring in all the available information about the Temple at the time and putting it together. They began to train priests and make vessels and priestly garments in preparation. But, they had a problem. Nobody had ever seen the Temple in operation and they had to make all of the functions, services, vessels, garments, buildings and structure come alive. You can talk about the Red Heifer ceremony all you want, but they wanted people to “see it.”

At that time, many immigrants were coming from Russia and other lands to Israel. Many of these people were artists and they began to draw Temple scenes out of the Jewish writings about the services. People began to “see” the Temple come alive. Slowly the attitude began to change and the people got excited. They began to realize through the pictures and the teachings just how important the Temple was and all the meaning behind what happened there.

In the non-Jewish world, many don’t have the same attitude about it right now and many don’t understand. They say things like, “That place will be for the false messiah, so what does that have to do with a true believer” or “The Temple or the sacrifices do nothing to purify hearts and minds.” Others say “The Temple was a horrible place, full of death and bloody.” Still others have said “The priests are wasting their time with all this because all of this has been done away with in Jesus” and so on. We have heard all of this, so if you haven’t, it is out there. However, nothing could be further from the truth. In our experience, groups like to bicker and fight about the stupidest things, little things. We know of one instance where one person still has a grudge against another person over paper towels after over 10 years!

But, the Temple is one area where people can unite together and study because it is bigger than all these petty little issues. If a person does not have much knowledge about it, they can pick up things they never saw before. If a person has much knowledge, they will still be able to learn more. No matter what level one is at, anyone can learn and that is the beauty of studying the Temple. At Sinai, Moses received the Commandments, but then he goes into 20 chapters about the Mishkan and the priesthood, korbanot and services. Why, you ask? Because God wants to “shkan” or “dwell” in his people (Exo 25.8). Also, it was going to be the key to understanding the Scriptures and eschatology, which is the study of the Messiah and the Redemption. There is more on the Temple and its services in the Scriptures than just about any other subject. There is a reason for this.

In the future on this website, we are going to get into many areas about the Temple like locations, archeological discoveries, structure, spiritual insights and meanings to a believer, the korbanot and the believer, the ceremonies and services, Solomon’s and Ezekiel’s Temple and so much more. All of these areas will open up the Gospels and Epistles and give you an understanding of something that is severely lacking in believers today. It will also give you common ground with others who don’t see things the way you do because the Temple was for all nations, and in studying the Temple, we can get on the same page about something very important and bigger than ourselves. That is why we should study the Temple and its services. For those who want to get into this deeper and want your own books and sources, here is a recommended list of items we think you should have to begin with or have access to in order to get started:
* The Mishnah
* The Mishneh Torah by Maimonides (can get on-line)
* Josephus and his works “History of the Jews” and “Wars of the Jews”
* Access to the Targums and the Septuagint
* The Temple by Alfred Edersheim
* Access to the Talmud
* Jerusalem Temple Study and go to “all teachings” and then “photo gallery”
* The Temple Institute site and look at all illustrations
* purchase the book “Measure the Pattern” by Hatikva Ministries

Besides these sources, we will give you others as we go along. Many of these can be accessed through the Internet. In our next teaching, we are going to begin with talking about the highest form of worship, which is a major topic in the Scriptures but is basically unknown in the non-Jewish world and they have no idea about it.

Posted in Articles, Idioms, Phrases and Concepts, Prophecy/Eschatology, The Festivals of the Lord, The Tanak, The Temple, Tying into the New Testament

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